


Imago

by inwhatfurnace



Category: Shoujo Kakumei Utena | Revolutionary Girl Utena
Genre: F/F, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-20
Updated: 2015-09-20
Packaged: 2018-04-22 15:31:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4840763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inwhatfurnace/pseuds/inwhatfurnace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No rings, no swords, no roses, but here they are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Imago

**Author's Note:**

> This started out as an attempt to explore how Anthy got from the end of the show to that image of her & Utena reunited... and almost turned into a coffeeshop AU. (Hit me up on tumblr [here](http://aetheling.tumblr.com)!)

"I’m… from the Academy,” she tells the first women she meets, in a strange little town at the edge of a forest at the end of the path leading away from the school.

“Are you alright, dear?” The women replies, and she realizes she has no idea what she must look like.

“I think I need a place to stay.” She gestures to her suitcase. Chuchu buries himself in the inside pocket of her jacket.

“Let’s get you to the inn, then.” The woman seems to ignore the way she tenses when her arm is taken. She allows herself to be led further into town.

The inn is a large stone building in the center of town, and while it has obviously seen better days, it’s clean. The innkeeper seems remarkably similar to the woman who brought her here, and she tries to remember to ask if they sisters, or even just related – maybe she’ll ask tomorrow, if she has to make small talk.

She stares down at her feet, and then slowly takes off her shoes. She finds bright, bleeding blisters on her heels and toes, and does not know when or how they formed. The insides of her shoes are covered in dried-blood brown and fresh-blood red.

“Oh, my,” the innkeeper begins to fuss the instant she sees Anthy’s feet. “Let me get some bandages.”

Chuchu curls himself up in the crook of her neck when she settles into bed hours later. The bandages on her feet are a little too tight, the blanket she’s underneath a little too heavy.

She breathes in, breathes out, and sleeps.

* * *

“I don’t have too much money,” Anthy tells the innkeeper when she brings up breakfast on a tray and sets it on her lap.

“Let’s worry about those feet of yours before we discuss anything else,” The innkeeper replies.

The next morning, she gingerly puts on sandals the innkeeper gives her and explores the town. It becomes her morning routine, and soon she knows the handful of people who live within a half hour’s walk of the inn. Anthy never says anything about how she seems to be the only guest – not only in the inn, but the entire town. 

“By the way, have you met the professor?” The innkeeper asks one day, as she’s cooking breakfast. “He used to teach at the Academy.”

* * *

The professor is an older man, with greying hair and crows’ feet that crinkle when he smiles. His eyes are not the color she remembers.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss Himemiya.”

If he remembers anything, he never shows it.

The professor’s house has its own greenhouse and laboratory, and a pretty sunroom perfect for taking tea in the afternoon.

“Do you garden, Miss Himemiya?” He asks as he prunes a lilac.  
“No,” she replies sweetly.

* * *

“I’ve been called back to the school I used to work at, Miss Himemiya. They want me to teach a seminar. Isn’t that exciting? I’ll be back in a few weeks.”

He packs just one small suitcase, and gives her the spare set of keys to his house.

The professor’s eyes have strange shade of pink in them the night he leaves.

She checks on his house every day after her morning walk. She lets herself in to the laboratory and stares at the professor’s specimen collection. He has a preference for chrysalides and cocoons - there are hundreds of them, pinned perfectly in clear glass cases. She presses a finger to one and watches it squirm.

* * *

The professor returns a few months later, fog in his eyes and mouth turned up into a smile. He looks even older now.

“It was all very nostalgic,” he replies, when she asks him how his seminar was. “The campus was just as I’d remembered it.”

One of the horses is gone, but the carousel still spins.

* * *

A few days later, the innkeeper brings a stunned young girl back with her from her morning shopping.

“I found her out on the path,” the innkeeper explains. “She hasn’t said a word.”

“Nanami,” Anthy says the instant their eyes meet. Chuchu squeaks cautiously from her shoulder. Nanami stares back, terrified.  
“Himemiya?” She breathes, and stumbles towards her.

* * *

“Do you think my hair used to be lighter?” Nanami tilts her head to look at her roots in the mirror of the bathroom they share. Chuchu holds up the comb she uses to part her braid. “I think it’s gotten darker.”

Nanami’s eyes have turned a soft grey. Anthy has noticed. She doesn’t say anything.

* * *

“I’m leaving,” Anthy tells Nanami as they eat breakfast one morning. Nanami puts down her cup of coffee and stares at her. “There’s another town a few miles over. Do you want to?”

Nanami frowns at the table, and then shakes her head.

“What if someone else leaves and there’s no one here?”

_There was no one here waiting for me_ , she thinks, viciously.

“I have to find her,” she says instead.

“Oh, that girl you’re looking for? Ten… jou, right? I remember her, a little.”

They’ve never spoken about what they now call _the Academy_ , and if Nanami doesn’t want to, Anthy certainly isn’t going to force her. But suddenly, she is desperate to know what Nanami remembers of Utena – is it different than what she does? Was there a quirk she forgot, a habit she let slip by unnoticed? Is Nanami’s Utena Tenjou anything like the girl she remembers? 

* * *

The professor calls a car for her and sees her off with a smile.

Nanami hesitates, then takes Anthy’s hand and squeezes. “Take care, Himemiya,” is all she says.

The town turns out to be a city, and she is instantly overwhelmed.

She finds a job in a stationery store, working with a few students from the city’s university for a woman who grumbles about the death of print at least once a week. She finds a little apartment, where Chuchu claims the bay window the instant they walk in. She writes Nanami letters, sends her a card filled with glitter on her birthday, and imagines visiting even farther-away places and writing postcards from them as she stocks shelves. She buys a cell phone. She asks her coworkers about applying to the university. Nanami writes back, her replies filled with absentminded doodles Anthy doesn’t always understand.

* * *

“Here’s your tea, miss.” The waitress sets the cup and saucer in front of her. “You’re welcome to stay as long as you like, but we close in an hour.”

“Thank you,” she replies, knowing it’s a little rude not to look at her server as she says it. She slips the cookie from the saucer to her jacket pocket, trying not to laugh out loud at the way Chuchu scrambles for it.

She likes spends her days off quietly.

* * *

“Wait! Please, wait!”

She’s been walking away from the café for at least five minutes before she hears the voice calling after her and turns towards it. A woman in a white baker’s jacket comes to a stop right in front of her, and rests her hands on her thighs as she tries to catch her breath.

“Chiyuki, uh, your waitress, she said you had a pretty name when she picked up your receipt, and I – I –”  
“You followed me because you liked my name?” Anthy replies, doing her best to keep her voice even.

The woman’s face falls, and then turns pink with embarrassment.

“Sorry, I did that all wrong.” She bows, and then holds out her hand. “I’m Utena Tenjou. It’s nice to meet you.”

Static starts to dance at the edge of her vision. She presses her fingers together, trying to make sure this isn’t a dream, or a joke, or some kind of torture. The faint lines around her eyes and mouth, her blonde curls of hair, this isn’t quite the Utena she remembers. But she remembers a softer-eyed Nanami complaining in front of the mirror, do you think my hair used to be lighter?

“Oh god, I’m sorry, I thought you were someone I went to school with, I’m so sorry, you must think –”

Utena is panicking; her face is completely red now. Anthy lifts a shaking hand to take Utena’s, and smiles – no rings, no swords, no roses, but here they are.

“My name’s Anthy Himemiya. It’s wonderful to meet you, Utena Tenjou.”


End file.
